214 WADING BIRDS. 



down, while the boatman, keeping his eye on the spot where 

 the bird fell, directs the vessel forward, and picks it up as 

 the gunner is loading. In this manner the boat continues 

 through and over the wild-rice marsh, the birds flushing and 

 falling, the gunner loading and firing, while the helmsman 

 is pushing and picking up the game ; which sport continues 

 till an hour or two after high water, when its shallowness, 

 and the strength and weight of the floating reeds, as also 

 the unwillingness of the game to spring as the tide de- 

 creases, oblige them to return. Several boats are some- 

 times within a short distance of each other, and a perpetual 

 cracking of musketry prevails along the whole reedy shores 

 of the river. In these excursions, it is not uncommon for an 

 active and expert marksman to kill ten or twelve dozen in 

 the serving of a sincrle tide. 



The Soree or Rail is about 9 inches or a little more in length : and 

 14 in alar extent. The bill yellow, blackish towards the point above, 

 a little more than | of an inch long, and a little short of ^ an 

 inch in vertical breadth. Lores, front, crown in the centre, chin, 

 and stripe down the throat, black. Line over the eye curved to the 

 front, cheeks and breast clear ash color. Sides of the crown, and 

 upper parts generally brown-olive, the feathers largely centered with 

 black on the back, scapulars and tertiaries, which feathers are 

 elegantly marked with subterminal lateral borders of pure white, 

 but broadly tipt with brown-olive, (in some specimens a few of the 

 larger tertiaries are spotted and partly barred with white on their 

 outer webs.) The sides of the head, neck, and the wing coverts 

 are almost wholly broAvn-olive. Wing plain dusky olive-brown ; the 

 exterior edge white. Tail pointed, dusky-brown olive, faintly cen- 

 tered with black ; the two or four middle feathers, for half their 

 length, faintly bordered on the inner webs with white. Under plu' 

 mage ; lower part of the breast marked with transverse curving bars 

 of white on a light ash ground. Centre of the belly white, sides 

 barred with black and white, with a mixture of olive-brown. Vent 

 buff. Legs and feet yellowish-green. Middle toe with its nail 1| 

 inches ; nail much compressed and hooked ; tarsus 1 inch 3 to 4 lines, 

 Irids reddish bay.el. 



